ZARIAH'S POV
He doesn't come to see me when they come to drag me out of the cold dungeon.
Then two guards unlock the steel door and yank me up by the arms, and I'm too stiff to even try to fight back.
My entire body aches from the hard laying the stone floor and my wrists are raw from how long I had spent banging on the door.
As for my throat, it feels so dry and bitter.
However despite all these, I hold my chin up, deciding not to give the guards and him indirectly, the satisfaction of looking spent.
I expect another cell, or maybe a punishment room, but what I don't expect is be taken to one of the guest suites in the large estate mansion and shown a long velvet blood red gown laid out on the bed in.
I lift the gown up and notice it's backless with a high slit and definitely very expensive.
"What the hell is this?" I ask one of the guards that had led me in, and he simply says.
"Your dress."
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It's twenty minutes later when I walk down the stairs and find him waiting.
The bastard.
He's dressed in all black with no tie, and a coat slung over his shoulder like he's the devil that's just about to cut a billion dollar deal.
He doesn't look at me immediately because he's talking to a man in a charcoal gray suit, so I just have to stand there in a four inch stilettos and a dress that hugs my body like sin, trying not to look as ashamed of it as I feel.
When his eyes finally find me, he doesn't smile, he just nods at me.
"Walk."
And I follow him like a dog--- which is exactly what he wants.
We drive in silence to a remote looking private hangar where armed men are waiting under low orange floodlights, and I see that planes are being loaded with crates— of guns, I assume.
Alaric grabs my hand as we step out;
"Say nothing unless I tell you to," he says coldly.
"You mean bark on command?" I snap and he looks at me with that slow, icy stare that makes me feel like he's about to choke me.
"If you embarrass me tonight, I won't need a dungeon to punish you."
I swallow, but I don't apologize.
No, I'm not going to apologize for breathing or for being difficult, and definitely not for hating the way I feel his fingers burn against mine when we walk toward the circle of men.
They're powerful---- I can tell it in the way they carry themselves in their designer clothing and polished leather shoes.
They must be weapons dealers, or cartel heads, or maybe ex military freaks.
And right now, every single one of them is looking at me as if I'm part of the merchandise they're loading into the planes.
"Gentlemen," Alaric says smoothly. "Let's make this fast."
They exchange greetings, numbers, and strange foreign words that I don't understand, and I just stand beside Alaric without saying a word.
Then suddenly, one of the men who is tall, bald and has a whole set of gold teeth, leans over to Alaric and says;
"Your girl's got good hips. She dance too?"
Without thinking I snap at the disgusting man,
"Why don't you ask your wife, Goldie? Oh wait— you don't have a wife, right?"
I doubt he does with his attitude.
Suddenly everyone becomes quiet and all the men turn to me, and then to Alaric and my heart slams into my ribs.
Alaric doesn't even look at me, he just sighs.
Then a few men step back, murmuring in Russian while Gold Tooth glares at me like I just spat in his drink.
"We're done," Alaric says. "We'll revisit when my property knows how to behave."
Then they leave, one by one and He still doesn't say a word as we walk back to the car.
When we get to the car, I try to open the door myself but he slams it back shut, turning to look at me.
"Kneel."
"What?"
"I said. Kneel."
We're in a dark lot behind the hangar with lots of gravel on the floor and there are several guards who are far enough not to hear what he's saying but still close enough to see what's going on.
So I shake my head at him. "You're not serious—"
Then his fingers grip my jaw, cutting my sentence off before I can finish it.
"I gave you one order tonight. And you couldn't follow it."
My breath trembles, "He was disgusting."
"He was powerful, and he was buying."
"So I'm for sale now?"
"You've been mine since the second you kept your heels on and begged me not to stop."
I feel fire crawl up my spine at his words but I can't give him a retort because it's true--- I did beg him that night and even the morning after he brought me back.
Suddenly he lets go of my jaw and steps back.
"Kneel, Zariah."
I hate that my knees bend immediately;
I hate that the gravel bites through the hem of the dress I'm wearing and mercilessly scrapes at my skin.
And I hate that I stay there, staring at the tops of his polished shoes while my throat just burns with humiliation.
"You embarrassed me in front of men who could snap your neck before you even blinked," he says.
"So now you'll learn what obedience feels like."
I want to scream and maybe spit at his feet, but instead I do nothing and say nothing.
And he lets the silence stretch like that, looking down at me on my knees in front of him for more than 30 minutes.
Then finally, he grabs my arm and yanks me to my feet.
"Let's go."
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We don't speak throughout the time in the car, and the second the door slams behind us back at the estate in his room, I pull away from him.
He doesn't like that.
"Don't touch me like I'm yours," I hiss.
"You are."
"No, I'm not."
But his voice justcdrops to a growl. "Then take off the fucking tattoo."
"I would if I could reach it."
Then he's on me before I can blink with one hand on my throat and the other sliding up my thigh, shoving the dress aside.
"You want punishment?" he hisses. "Fine. I'll give you exactly what you deserve."
He drags me to the bed, rips the dress down the middle from my breasts and exposes every inch of my skin.
However I slap him, and hard, but instead of wincing, he pins both of my wrists above my head, then proceeds to trace his tongue down my exposed throat... slowly.
... Very slowly... agonisingly slowly and every second ends up with me gasping and writhing, one moan at a time even when I try to hold the sounds in.
"Say you're mine," he breathes against my skin.
"No," I rasp, bitting my lips to hold back a moan but then gasping when his hand slides deeper down my thigh and inside me with his fingers.
"Say it."
"Go to hell."
He growls, spearing me with three of his digits continuously at the same time, and I scream.
Not in fear, fuck no.
He makes me come while whispering filth against my throat, making me shamelessly beg for more while calling me reckless, stupid and 'fucking stubborn'.
Afterward, I lie there in the rumpled sheets and the scent of him still on my skin.
His arm rests over my hip possessively and he mumurs,
"Do you still think you're not mine?"
I don't answer.
... because I don't know anymore.